West St. Paul: Mendota Heights opts out of ice arena study

Mendota Heights is cool to the idea of joining neighboring cities and School District 197 in a task force that would consider options for replacing West St. Paul's aging ice arena.

The Mendota Heights City Council has decided to exclude the city from the Sibley Area Hockey Arena Study Force, despite vocal support from residents at a meeting earlier this month.

A subcommittee of the West St. Paul City Council first ran the idea by Mendota Heights, Sunfish Lake and the school district in the spring. Sunfish Lake and the West St. Paul-Mendota Heights-Eagan school district have signed on, while Eagan, Lilydale and Mendota have not yet been approached.

Mendota Heights Mayor Sandra Krebsbach told arena supporters she was concerned that joining the task force would be "starting down a road" to an eventual commitment of a shared arena.

"I know you want to push us -- 'Do it; if you care, you'll do it' -- but we are also looking at kind of this whole mix of things," said Krebsbach, who voted against participating, as did Liz Petschel and Mike Povolny.

Petschel said she believes a new arena would operate at a loss and that she does not want to put that "on the back of the residents."

West St. Paul Civic Arena is home to Henry Sibley High School's boys and girls teams and the Sibley Area Youth Hockey Association. However, its days are numbered.

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The arena, which was built in 1972, is in need of a new roof, cooling system, floor and repairs to roof beams. The West St. Paul City Council has said it would not be cost-effective to make the estimated $1.5 million upgrades.

According to the task force proposal, the Minnesota Amateur Sports Commission would conduct a user-demand study -- free of charge -- to identify whether it would be feasible to build a new arena and, if so, where. Financing options also would be identified.

Frank Friedmann, former president of the Sibley Area Youth Hockey Association, noted that nearly half the 387 kids who played last year were from Mendota Heights.

"All of the ISD 197 area uses that arena," he said.

The proposed seven- member task force would employ a weighted voting system depending on a community's population and number of arena users. West St. Paul and Mendota Heights each would have 40 percent, with the school district having 10 percent and Sunfish Lake holding 6 percent. Eagan, Lilydale and Mendota would make up the other 4 percent.

District 197's school board agreed to be part of the task force last month, but at the same time added caveats that it was not interested in financing construction of an arena and that participation in the discussion "would be contingent upon the District assuming no business risk or ongoing maintenance of the facility."

West St. Paul Mayor John Zanmiller said that while he was surprised by Mendota Heights' decision, the study is moving forward.

"Ideally, all the communities that have ties to Henry Sibley would be involved," he said.